Union’s Suit Against State Over Retiree Health Costs Will Move Forward

A lawsuit that the union for civil service employees in New York filed against the state regarding retirees’ health insurance costs will be allowed to move forward.

A federal judge denied a motion to dismiss the case, CSEA announced Tuesday. The union claims that the state illegally raised the required health insurance contributions of retirees.

CSEA and a coalition of other unions sued the state in December 2011 on behalf of former employees who retired between 1983 and 2011. The lawsuit claimed that the state and the Unified Court System violated the retirees’ contracts when the state raised retiree contributions rates from 10 to 12 percent for individual coverage and from 25 to 27 percent for family coverage that October.

The union argued that it is illegal for the state to increase costs for members who are already retired.

“Nobody bargained for these increases. Not the union and certainly not the retirees living on fixed incomes who are being hit hard by higher costs,” said CSEA President Danny Donohue in a statement. “We’re encouraged that a judge has agrees what the state did may be legally wrong. We are certain what they did is morally wrong.”

U.S. District Judge Mae A. D’Agostino denied the motion to dismiss CSEA’s complaint. The case will proceed to the discovery phase of litigation.

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Jon Campbell has been covering government and politics for the Gannett Albany Bureau since May 2011. Previously, he covered health and environmental issues for the Press & Sun-Bulletin in Binghamton, N.Y., with a focus on natural gas development in the Marcellus Shale.

Joseph Spector is Gannett Albany Bureau chief and has covered New York politics and government since 2002. He was the political reporter for the Democrat and Chronicle and has since joined the Albany Bureau, covering state government for all of Gannett New York.

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